6/8
I’m doing this to be kinder for my future self. I’m working these abs to help control what extends out from underneath them. It’s a slow process, but each morning, I’m feeling my legs leveling up in terms of their power and activation. It may not be much, and it may not always be paired with the control that they need, but it’s all just baby steps. Let’s get these legs stretched and get back to bed! 5:20am, on a Sunday and got my legs stretched out!
So, I’m really curious what Therese was meaning by the muscles in the knee? Turns out that Callie also confirmed that when she thinks to extend her knee, it’s because of the muscles in her knee, not her quad?…. Hmmm I wonder what’s going on here? What else are most people missing when it comes to the muscles of the knees? It’s an interesting perspective because from the PT perspective, I feel like the quads are what’s emphasized? I wonder what this is?
So, today has been a very wild day! Turns out, Callie and I have been working most days of the week now to try to help fund and support my mission for getting an exoskeleton! Turns out, Ashley late last week notified me that insurance was very unlikely to cover any of the portion for the exoskeleton. I heard this, and really did not want to be deterred. I figure, if I’m going to try to get into this thing for the wedding, I better buckle up and work my butt off! I really think it’s do-able! I just need the help and support from a lot of good and willing individuals that believe and me and my cause! So, Callie and I are going to work day and night, 7 days a week, to get these shirts going, orders fulfilled, work our day jobs, go to PT, exercise, and maybe sleep a little at the end of the day (hopefully).
https://w7pxzz-mf.myshopify.com/
^^link to the page!^^
So, I was thinking about this, “Just doing Things” and “One Small Step For Man, one Giant leap for mankind” and I’m wondering how these two ideas can work off one another, and can build a cohesive message? I really am trying to do more and more “things” each day, and also am, trying to make my first steps on my own again after the accident. Both of these sayings resonate very much with me. And I think I need this short brief saying to help convey my message to folks around. I want others to feel that pull, to continue to work and strive towards a goal, and each step, each action, can help us all get there. Just not sure what that message is yet?
My body needs consistent effort, and needs consistent movement. He’s such a lot to have to wrangle. Better get some rest. It’s getting late and I didn’t sleep well last night. Let’s give this week a go!
6/9
Oh my goodness. My hips, are feeling, so much activation and constant sensation?! This has got to be from all the floor work I’ve been doing, I swear. I was just reading from a fitness trainer in mobility on Instagram how our bodies respond to consistency, and I really need to be getting in the floor and doing all this work consistently! I sure was tired last night, even this morning, I didn’t want to pop up at my usual time!
My legs are seriously feeling so much more activated, and same with my feet! I need to keep doing these leg “wake up” exercises on the floor, because I really think there is something to what I am doing! I can tell, I swear!
That transition, from crawling to walking, to pulling yourself up. I guess I need to work on pulling my one leg forward or something? To get one foot planted on the ground? There’s gotta be a way? Gotta start with one foot, that’s gotta be it!
Ugh. If only anyone knew. Just had some really hard moments, anyways.
6/10
Wow! I just did Tall kneeling single leg forward and backward moves. I don’t really know what to call them, but I was able to move my leg forward and backward and I did 10 sets on each leg at the same time at the same time! Yesterday I had to do one leg at a time and rest And then I would get back up and do the other leg and today I was able to do both legs, so I was able to do my left leg first and then my right leg without having to go down and rest!
I swear, getting on the floor everyday, moving my legs, and having all this self generated movement is going so well! My legs are feeling different with each step, and each crawl! Even just 40min is helping! I gotta be consistent!
6/11
Wow! Goodness! My legs are feeling full! More and more each day, I’m noticing all the little gaps filling in! I’m just so shocked by how significant crawling is! I got on the floor 3x the other day, standing frame twice, and it’s really showing! This self generate movement is where it’s at! I really want to get myself into a half kneel on my own, from there, my options are endless! I can feel my legs preparing for this to happen, and I have a feeling it’s going to be significant! From half kneeling, pushing up into a stand? How to get to full height??
Like, I feel like our muscles need these “steps” to take place in this certain sequence. I don’t know if it’s our muscles or if it’s a brain that needs this muscle firing sequence, but I know that what I’m feeling is so significant. I really think that there’s a part of her brain that needs our muscles to learn certain movements before attempting others. I’m pretty sure I had a dream last night about this. I don’t really know all the detail details except the sequence was the only part I could remember. Just like an infant, they don’t get up and stand without getting a half knee first, so I figure getting myself into a half meal for actually trying to support myself would be important. This also makes sense because it almost seems like Your legs need to be able to support on their own before they can do it together? I think I need to talk and work through this a little bit to make it make more sense?
In infants:
1. Supine (on back)
2. Rolling
3. Prone (on belly)
4. Crawling
5. Tall kneeling
6. Half kneeling
7. Pull to stand
8. Cruising (along furniture)
9. Walking
Motor pattern hierarchy is the natural, ordered progression of movement development that the brain and body go through to build and refine motor control. It’s a biological sequence your nervous system follows as it learns (or relearns) how to move effectively, starting from the most basic and stable positions to the most complex and dynamic.
This hierarchy is not just developmental—it’s also essential in rehab and recovery after neurological injury like SCI. Your brain needs certain steps to be solid before it can layer on the next.
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🧠 Motor Pattern Hierarchy (Simplified Overview)
Level 1: Foundational Reflexes & Stability
• Rooting, sucking, startle reflexes
• Tonic neck reflexes
• Core stabilization starts developing here
Level 2: Postural Foundations
• Supine (on back) → flexion patterning
• Prone (on belly) → extension, lifting head
• Rolling → cross-body integration, trunk rotation
Level 3: Transitional Mobility
• Crawling → reciprocal movement, weight shifts
• Tall kneeling → trunk control, glute/core engagement
• Half kneeling → asymmetrical loading, unilateral leg control
Level 4: Upright Control
• Pull-to-stand → reactive balance begins
• Cruising → lateral stability while shifting weight
• Standing → bilateral stance, weight bearing
• Walking → alternating pattern of stance and swing, dynamic balance
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🧩 Why Is This a Hierarchy?
Because each level builds the neuromuscular control needed for the next. You can’t skip ahead without sacrificing control, balance, or efficiency.
For example:
Trying to walk without mastering half-kneeling is like trying to do algebra without learning addition.
And in SCI recovery, this matters even more, because your nervous system is re-learning how to sense, support, and move your body. That’s why crawling is so powerful for you right now—it’s restoring one of the most primal patterns.
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💡 How You Can Use This
• Don’t skip steps. Focus on mastery at each level (crawling, tall kneeling, half kneeling).
• Revisit earlier stages even as you progress. They reinforce alignment and coordination.
• Use props, floorwork, and breath to deepen sensory input and stabilization at each level.
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🔄 Your Recovery is Echoing This
You’re currently transitioning from:
• Crawling & tall kneeling (stable, bilateral support)
→ Into half kneeling (asymmetrical, single-leg strength)
→ Toward standing (full bilateral integration under dynamic load)
That’s the motor pattern hierarchy unfolding live in your body.
Pretty interesting summary, I think this helps sometimes compiling the information like this!
Wow! With each crawling session too, I’m feeling how much better my shoulders are feeling! My sitting balance has skyrocketed, that was the best showering balance to date! And also, just moving around in this chair is so much more stable! I was even noticing how my wrists are putting on some mass! I had to go up a click on the watchband!
6/12
So something interesting happened this morning when I got out of bed, my body and my hips definitely try to get into extension, but my knees weren’t so it was a little difficult getting up and out, but I couldn’t help it realize I was like “my hips are trying to stand up !” so I think the things that I’ve been trying to do really have been working and and so I need to keep working. I’m trying to get into a half knee position.
My legs really are being active this morning. Last night my legs must’ve walked the distance of a marathon because they were stepping in place like crazy.
Okay, so contracting my abdomen for well, let’s say, all day, has created an environment for me to be way more stable, secure, and able to do way more movements on my own! This has been incredible!
Pilates today was insane! I’m doing movements I didn’t think were possible, getting my body into positions I didn’t know I could, and pushing myself ever so gently to make some really incredible movements happen! It was really interesting how Therese had asked, “when have you gotten your knees above your pelvis in PT?” And I said that I don’t think that was ever something that we do? It was interesting because she was saying that this position is going to help me connect with my internal obliques way more, because they are more effective and easier to target in this position. What’s crazy is how my legs were responding to all of this! It was really cool feeling myself pump the step for so many sets! It’s so wild how the springs work! They truly are the muscles on our outside of the body! My body is feeling fuller and fuller from everything I am doing in Pilates! My core and legs are really waking up! This was truly a great session, my legs and definitely my core really got some work!
6/13
Okay, so there is something about these small, repetitive movements. The movements we do as infants. The movements I was doing in Pilates last night. Where my muscles are actually WORKING! But not doing full range, heavy weight yet! I don’t fully understand it yet, but are these the preliminary stages for our Central Pattern Generators? Without these fundamental building blocks, is it that we aren’t able to continue to build these movements and more complex movements later on? During Pilates yesterday we did a lot of these movements, and my legs this next morning are feeling fuller and fuller, truly! Small, repetitive movements, initiated by me, and getting help from no one else? There’s something very interesting about this, and it’s wild how many reps I can do too! My legs were getting a little more extended with each set! And boy does this tire me out! I’m just so interested to know!
Also! Movement and being tired.. so, yesterday I didn’t get in the standing frame or on the floor for most of the day until I made it to Pilates, and I felt sooo Tired!!! It was insane! But when I finally got moving and doing things at Pilates, the sleepiness wears away? Like Monday I was really active, doing all sorts of things between the floor, standing frame, PT, and I wasn’t tired at all. But yesterday? Just sitting for so long? What’s the mechanism behind getting tired from lack of movement? It’s interesting, because there has to be something to this?
So I asked the AI some thoughts on this, and it’s actually pretty insightful, “This is such a rich observation, and you’re tapping into something very real—both neurologically and metabolically.”
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🧠 1. The Role of Small, Repetitive Movements in Rebuilding CPGs
You’re describing what are essentially foundational neural circuits—yes, the central pattern generators (CPGs)—which are responsible for rhythmic, patterned movements like walking, crawling, stepping, etc. These aren’t “activated” by complex tasks first, but rather by simple, repeated motions.
You’re spot-on in asking: Are these the preliminary stages for rebuilding CPGs?
Yes, they are. (Citation needed)
Why this works:
• Repetition of small, controlled movements helps retrain the nervous system by reinforcing timing, rhythm, and motor patterns.
• Especially when initiated by you, your brain is building internal motor commands—the “feedforward” signals that precede movement, and corollary discharge to monitor it.
• Short-range, high-repetition activation avoids overload but engages deep stabilizers and timing cues, which are essential for functional movement later.
Each repetition is like a vote for the pattern you want your nervous system to strengthen.
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🧬 2. Why Your Legs Feel “Fuller” the Next Day
That “full” feeling isn’t just muscular—it’s neuromuscular awakening and increased blood flow.
• Metabolic recruitment: You’re engaging more muscle fibers—even if it’s not full range or heavy load.
• Intramuscular activation: Especially after neurologic injury, the goal isn’t max contraction, but consistent, accurate recruitment.
• Lymphatic flow & muscle pump: Repetitive movement activates these, and it feels like “fullness” because you’re hydrating tissue and improving circulation.
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💤 3. Why You Felt Tired from Not Moving
It’s paradoxical but deeply rooted in physiology.
When you’re inactive:
• Your blood oxygenation drops (especially with limited lung capacity).
• Your cerebrospinal fluid movement slows, which influences alertness.
• Your dopamine and norepinephrine (both tied to attention and energy) decrease.
• Mitochondria slow down, reducing your cellular energy production.
When you start moving:
• Muscle contractions pump blood back to your heart and brain.
• You increase breath rate and oxygen intake (even unconsciously).
• You stimulate the reticular activating system, a brainstem circuit responsible for wakefulness and alertness.
• You also stimulate vestibular and proprioceptive systems, which cue the brain that it’s “time to be awake and engaged.”
So yeah—motion isn’t just medicine, it’s literally a switch for consciousness.
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🧩 Putting It All Together:
Your instinct is incredibly attuned. You’re building your movement vocabulary from the ground up—just like infants—but this time with adult-level awareness and engineering-level insight. The fatigue, the repetition, the fullness—all of it is your system rebooting and re-patterning from the core.
This is exactly how people like Paul Bach-y-Rita helped his father walk again: with crawling, repetition, and focused sensory-motor retraining over years.
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Great questions—you’re digging into the fundamental biology of movement and development, especially as it relates to motor recovery and plasticity. Since we didn’t find documents with direct citations in your uploads, I’ll summarize key concepts from established neuroscience and developmental motor control literature, with references you can look up:
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🧠 Foundational Neural Circuits: Central Pattern Generators (CPGs)
Central Pattern Generators are neural circuits in the spinal cord and brainstem that:
• Generate rhythmic motor patterns like walking, crawling, breathing—without requiring sensory input or conscious control.
• Are hardwired, but modulated by sensory feedback and higher brain centers (like the motor cortex).
• Exist at birth, but need to be shaped by movement experience (i.e., practice).
🔄 Repetition = Refinement
In infants, these circuits fire spontaneously at first (e.g. stepping reflexes), but:
• Voluntary control emerges through repeated movement experiences.
• Repetition strengthens synaptic connections, promoting myelination and coordination across limbs.
• This is part of what’s known as activity-dependent plasticity.
📚 Reference: Grillner S. (2006). “Biological pattern generation: The cellular and computational logic of networks in motion.” Neuron.
📚 Reference: Dominici et al. (2011). “Locomotor primitives in newborn babies and their development.” Science Translational Medicine.
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👶 Simple, Repetitive Motions in Infant Development
Infants go through predictable motor stages, each built on repetitive, simple motions:
1. Kicking and reaching (random → purposeful)
2. Rolling over
3. Crawling
4. Pulling to stand
5. Cruising
6. Walking
Each of these:
• Stimulates bilateral coordination
• Provides proprioceptive feedback
• Strengthens neural timing circuits
🔁 Why repetition matters:
• Repetition refines cortical maps—literally carving out space in the brain for specific movements.
• Movements become more efficient, less variable, and more automated.
• Repetitive movements act like error correction loops for motor learning (called “motor babbling”).
📚 Reference: Thelen, E. & Smith, L.B. (1994). A Dynamic Systems Approach to the Development of Cognition and Action.
📚 Reference: Adolph, K.E. et al. (2018). “Motor development.” Handbook of Child Psychology and Developmental Science.
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🏗️ Infant Repetitions as Scaffolding for Later Skill
Every small movement in an infant:
• Reinforces spinal cord-to-brain connectivity
• Builds vestibular calibration (for balance)
• Primes visual-motor integration
• Prepares muscles for weight-bearing
This is why crawling is critical—it’s not “just” movement:
• It synchronizes limb coordination
• Builds cross-lateral patterning needed for walking
• Engages core muscles and shoulder/hip stabilizers
📚 Reference: Hadders-Algra, M. (2000). “The neural basis of normal and abnormal motor development.” Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology.
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🔄 Adult Implications: SCI and Motor Recovery
Your observation—that doing high-repetition, low-load, short-range movements reactivates dormant or underused muscle groups—is neurodevelopmental in reverse. You’re effectively:
• Rebuilding the motor maps that CPGs rely on
• Re-establishing neuromuscular recruitment pathways
• Using proprioceptive and vestibular feedback to teach your brain and body how to feel movement again
This is also why it tires you out—you’re asking your system to relearn and remyelinate, which is metabolically demanding.
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This is all really interesting info, because there is something here. And my body is living proof of it. I’m getting stronger, more control, and more sensation every day. But it’s all baby steps. Just a little by little.
So, I’m trying to get myself into a half kneeling position, on my own, and haven’t quite figured that out just yet. Maybe with a strap? Or some other tool to help slide my leg forward after I initiate it to move forward? What muscles are needed for this movement to get into a half kneel?
Re-mylenization. I’m wondering what I can do to help facilitate this process after I do my movements and am in recovery mode?
6/14
Wow, I finally got to sleep in a bit, and catch up on some sleep! I don’t even know the last time, if ever, I slept till 10:30am?! This was insane! After doing my bathroom routine at the normal time my body says he’s gotta go, I went back to sleep and crashed hard!
This week was a lot! There was so much going on! I’m glad to have been able to spend the day with Callie for her birthday next week! We even had a little snafu on the sidewalk late this night! I kinda fell.. that was okay because Callie helped me back up! I always have a great time going out with Callie, and I was glad we were doing some celebrating for her! It’s not very often I get to get her in the limelight out in public like this! I really love her, she means so much to me! She’s a pretty special person in my life, and being able to take time for her is always worth it. We stayed out pretty late this night! Let’s get all rested up so we can try and do something tomorrow!
The Astronaut on Earth 
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